The present teachings relate to a method for controlling a remote vehicle, and in particular, a remote vehicle control method in which a remote vehicle payload is automatically positioned to approach an object within a field of view of a sensor.
Remote vehicles are useful in a variety of military, law enforcement, and other applications to provide for unmanned access to buildings, particularly in situations, such as earthquakes, hurricanes, fires, etc., in which human access is dangerous and therefore preferably avoided. As buildings typically consist of a multitude of individual rooms, which may are separated by doors that may be in a closed position, it is desirable for remote vehicles to have the ability to manipulate doors to enter rooms. It is also desirable to provide quicker and easier door opening abilities, either through an enhanced device, enhanced software, or a combination of both, to simplify remote operation and allow the remote vehicle to inspect a structure more quickly.
Currently, some remote vehicles are operated by users at remote locations, who utilize, for example, cameras or other image sensing devices to determine how to manipulate the remote vehicle and end effectors of the remote vehicle to traverse spaces, perform tasks, access doors, approach doorknobs, open the doors, grasp objects etc. Manually-controlled performance of some or all of these tasks can be time-consuming and require precision by the operator in order to correctly approach, access, and manipulate doorknobs to open the doors on which the doorknobs are disposed. Minimizing the amount of manual control by the operator would significantly reduce the amount of time and effort involved in opening a door.